The Curse of the Viking Grave

by Farley Mowat

  “When the Innuit men came back to the camp they found many of their wives and children buried beneath rock graves, and the women weeping for them. Airut and both of Koonar’s children were amongst the dead. Koonar lay in a tent and would speak to no one. He had drawn the arrow out of his gut with his own hand, but the wound was black and stinking.

  “He would speak to none until Kiliktuk, the angeokok, came to his side. First Koonar swore terrible oaths. Then he bade Kiliktuk bring him wood and the hard, springy horns of musk ox. And when Kiliktuk had done these things, Koonar told him to shape the wood so, and the horn so, and join them so. And when it was done, Kiliktuk held in his hand just such a bow as this which I have shown to you.

  “Then Koonar spoke. ‘This is the Child of Death. Take it as my gift. Take it and go to the forests where the Itkilit are, and slay them where they walk and where they sleep. Let not one remain alive in all the land.’

  “And when he had spoken, he died.

  “Kiliktuk had his body carried to a certain high place beside Innuit Ku, and there he was laid with all the things which had been his, yes, even to his great knife which was a priceless thing. And when this had been done, the People built a house over Koonar, and they built it of stone as he had told them the houses were built in his own land.

  “There Koonar lies. And Koonar’s House is the place that you have seen.

  “As for the bow. We did not take it south in search of vengeance. That is not our way. But we made many such bows, and then we were able to kill deer whenever there was need of meat. And with these bows we were able to keep the Itkilit out of our lands, for they grew to have a terrible fear of the Child of Death.

  “So we prospered until the Innuit were as many as flies over all this land. We used the Child of Death to make life, and it was good. It was the greatest gift that ever came to us, and had we kept it, who knows, perhaps we would still be many, and not a people numbering so few it will not be many more winters before the last of us has vanished.

  “Now I am tired; I am old and soon must sleep. Go now, for I am old….”

  CHAPTER 13

  A Change of Plan

  ANGELINE AND THE THREE BOYS were engrossed in their own thoughts as they left Elaitutna’s tent and made their way back to their own place. The Cree girl’s eyes were shining with the sheen of suppressed tears. The tragic tale of Koonar seemed so vivid to her that it might have been something which had happened only yesterday.

  They had all been deeply moved by the story, but its effect on Peetyuk was particularly profound. He remained silent, and his usually cheerful face was clouded with inner misery. By suppertime the other three had begun to worry about him, and they tried to cheer him up.

  “It was a long time ago Koonar died,” Awasin reminded him.

  Peetyuk raised his face, and his eyes seemed peculiarly dark and brooding.

  “I not think of Koonar. I think of the Ihalmiut. They my people. When I grow up here, I know often there no meat, and sometimes babies die and old people starve. Now I think what Elaitutna say. One time many people, many deer, and no people starve. Now few people, few deer, and maybe soon all people starve. I think this happen to Ihalmiut if no one help.”

  “That’s the Government’s job, to help when people starve,” Jamie said. “The trouble is, nobody but a couple of traders knows about your people, Peetyuk. I bet the Government doesn’t even know they exist. But when we go south we’ll tell everybody about them, and about what’s happening to them.”

  Awasin’s quiet voice ruthlessly punctured Jamie’s enthusiasm.

  “Do you think they will listen, Jamie? Do not forget what happened to the Chipeweyans. Many times the white men have been asked for help, but how often has help come? Peetyuk’s people are far away from your people. Even if the white men believe us, they will find it easy to forget.”

  “But I won’t let them forget!” Jamie cried defensively. “I’ll see they don’t. I’ll make such a stink everyone will hear about it and they’ll have to do something!”

  Awasin was inexorable. “How will you do that? You are only one person and the police are hunting you. Who will listen to your voice? I know how Peetyuk feels, Jamie, but you can never know. You are my best friend, and a friend of the Indians and the Eskimos, but you can never know what we feel. We will get little help from the white men.”

  Jamie was struck silent by an unfamiliar strain of bitterness in Awasin’s voice. Before he could think of a reply, Peetyuk broke in.

  “Awasin say truth. I tell how it was with Ihalmiut. You listen good, Jamie. One time Ihalmiut strong, get plenty deer meat, hunt white fox all winter. Every two winters, strongest men take big load white fox to coast to trader. Bring back guns, shells, fox traps. Very long, hard trip, take two-three months. Only men with full bellies can make such trip. Only hunter with full belly can go hundred miles on Barrens in winter for catch white fox. Then many years ago, when I not yet born, men take big load white fox to trader. When they get to coast, trader say white fox no good now. Not worth nothing. Men come back without guns and shells. That winter ten-twenty people die because men have no bullets to kill deer in wintertime. After that, cannot hunt fox in winter. And every year not so many deer. Too much kill by white men in the south. So Eskimos must stay at camp and eat little, and everyone hungry before spring come. Four-five years ago Ohoto and three men go coast again. Tell trader must have shells. He laugh and say, bring many furs.

  “Awasin right. White men only help white men. My father white man, but maybe I try forget that. Better my father Eskimo.”

  For the first time since he had come to the north, Jamie was aware of the chasm yawning between him and the people of that land. The sensation frightened him.

  “Listen,” he said desperately. “Not all whites are like the ones you’ve had to deal with. What about my Uncle Angus? And there are lots more like him down south. I tell you, if they only knew what was happening they’d send help. We’ll make the Government do something….” His voice trailed off lamely, for he could see that Awasin and Peetyuk did not believe him. He felt utterly miserable, and very lonely. He was wracking his brain for some way to heal the breach when Angeline spoke. Her voice was gentle.

  “I have been thinking. Jamie has said the Viking things are worth much money to the people in the south. Those were Koonar’s things. He married an Eskimo woman and had children here. Would he not have wished to help the Eskimos even more than he did? Do you not think, if those things are worth much money, that some of it should go to Peetyuk’s people? Then they could buy guns and shells and other things they must have to live.”

  Jamie’s relief was almost pathetic.

  “Sure!” he cried. “That’s it! I tell you, that stuff’s worth thousands to a museum. There’ll be plenty of money to look after Uncle Angus and all Peetyuk’s people too. And listen, another thing, newspapers will want to hear the story of how we found the stuff. We can tell them all about the Eskimos’ troubles. It’ll get read all over the country. The Government will be bound to step in. They won’t be able to forget about it.”

  Peetyuk was looking at Angeline, and for the first time that evening a smile flickered on his face. He half reached out his hand as if to touch her shoulder, then thought better of it and turned, not to Jamie, but to Awasin.

  “You think that work, Awasin?”

  “Perhaps,” Awasin replied cautiously. “If we can sell these things ourselves. But the white men might take them from us and give nothing back. Such things have happened with our people—and with yours.”

  “It won’t happen this time!” Jamie cut in fiercely. “We found the stuff and nobody can take it away from us. We’ll cache it before we get to The Pas and just take one thing to show what we’ve got. And we won’t let anyone know where the cache is until we’re sure they’re going to play square.”

  “That is a good plan,” Awasin agreed. “Only I do not like going to The Pas. There we have no friends, and some enemies. The police
there must be very angry with us. They will not make it easy for us.”

  An idea struck Jamie and came bubbling out of him like a waterfall.

  “Peetyuk! When your people used to go to the coast, where did they go? Was it to Churchill? Could we go out the same way? If we could get to Churchill we’d be all set. It’s a pretty big place and nobody would know who we are. I could wire my old school principal in Toronto from there. He was a great bug on history. He knows the museum people. I’ll bet he’d help us all he could.”

  Peetyuk tried to deal with this spate of questions.

  “Old times my people go in winter, across country, with dogsled to Churchill. Not go straight way because might meet Chipeweyans. Go long way round down Angiku—Big River—nearly to coast. Our people call Churchill Iglu-ujarik—Stone House—because big stone fort there. I not know for sure, but think maybe we go down Big River with canoe.”

  The depression which had been the aftermath of the visit to Elaitutna had now been dispelled. There was an excited babble of talk as the four began discussing details of the changed plans. It was interrupted when Peetyuk’s Uncle Ohoto lifted the tent flap and thrust in his round, beaming face to announce that supper was ready at his tent.

  They trooped after him to his topay and found places on the floor around the big wooden meat tray which Peetyuk’s mother had filled to overflowing with boiled ribs. As they ate, Peetyuk explained the new plans to the several Eskimos present.

  Kakut, who had joined them for the meal, listened intently. “Eema!” he said thoughtfully. “In the very old days the people sometimes went down Big River in kayaks to salt water and there met the sea Innuit to trade for seal skins. But none of us has ever gone that way in summer—only in winter, on the ice. We will ask Elaitutna about it. He is the one who knows about the old things.”

  During the next few days the spring thaw was almost brought to a standstill by the return of bad weather. Frost at night, and gray, windy days with frequent sleet squalls kept the river ice from clearing. The boys and Angeline stayed close to the camp. Their impatience to reach Koonar’s grave had been whetted by Elaitutna’s story, and they found the waiting very hard. Nevertheless, there was nothing to be done about it. Awasin employed himself overhauling the party’s gear. Jamie spent much time with Ohoto—who had taken a particular fancy to the white youth—trying to learn something of the Eskimo language. Angeline and Peetyuk seemed to be together a good deal—a fact which Jamie did not overlook.

  The period of foul weather came to an end, and a week after the visit to Elaitutna, Peetyuk announced that the river was sufficiently free of ice to permit canoe travel. It was decided that they should start for Koonar’s grave the following morning, using their own two Chipeweyan canoes and accompanied by Ohoto and Kakut in kayaks. The dogs were to be left at the Eskimo camp under the care of Bellikari.

  The Stone House—as they continued to think of the grave mound—was about thirty miles downstream on Innuit Ku from the camps. The current ran so fast that it took the party only half a day to reach the rapids where Jamie and Awasin had wrecked their canoe the previous summer.

  The cataract was not yet in sight, although its roaring voice filled their ears, when Kakut led the flotilla to the shore. The kayaks and canoes were hauled up on the bank and the party went forward on foot.

  As they looked down over the foaming white torrent, Jamie and Awasin exchanged glances. Peetyuk noticed the exchange, and shouted out so that everyone else could hear, “You two angry we not run rapids? Eskimo big coward? Only white man and Cree got brave enough run big rapid like that.”

  “Cut it out, Peetyuk,” Jamie answered. “We weren’t brave. We were darn fools, and you know it!”

  “You only shy,” Peetyuk said, grinning. “When we go down Big River to coast maybe you show poor Eskimo boy how run big rapids too. I learn quick from you I bet.”

  The exchange was cut short by a gesture from Ohoto, who had reached the crest of a low ridge ahead of the rest. He was pointing to the north, and as the others climbed up beside him they stopped and stood in silence looking out over a thaw-flooded valley toward a rocky hill upon whose crest stood a massive stone structure.

  This was the Stone House they had come so far to seek. This was the grave of Koonar, the Man of Iron.

  CHAPTER 14

  Koonar’s Grave

  ON THAT SPRING DAY THE UNENDING sweep of rolling plain held a quality of desolation which even the hard white sunlight could not dispel. The land seemed unutterably empty, devoid even of the memory of living things. No birds sang. No caribou moved across the monochromatic wilderness of rocky ridges, sodden tundra, and melting drifts. The mosses and lichens underfoot were not yet quickening. They remained dun-colored in their winter lifelessness.

  This was the Barrenlands at its most somber hour, freed from the winter sleep but not yet stirring into the short summer frenzy of new life. It was a gray-faced corpse.

  Angeline, Awasin and Jamie all felt the oppressive sense of lifelessness and involuntarily moved closer to one another. The Eskimos and Peetyuk were not immune to it either. Ohoto muttered something almost under his breath, and Kakut nodded his heavy head.

  “They say they stay here. Wait for us,” Peetyuk told his friends. “Not go Koonar grave. I not feel happy go there either; but if you go, I go.”

  Jamie shook himself and tried to speak briskly.

  “Let’s not start acting like a bunch of kids in a haunted house. There’s nothing to be scared of. Awasin and I spent a night alongside the Stone House and I crawled right into it. I know it seems pretty spooky, but there’s no such thing as ghosts anyway. Come on, lets go.”

  Awasin and Peetyuk glanced at each other and Awasin answered for both of them.

  “Perhaps there are no spirits in your own country, Jamie. Perhaps white men have eyes that do not see what we see. White men know many things but they do not know all things.” He shrugged and turned to pick up his carrying bag. Slinging it over his shoulder, he turned back to Jamie. “Even the blind hare feels the presence of the great white owl,” he concluded, and strode off toward the distant loom of the Stone House.

  The other three fell in behind him and Jamie had nothing to say. Not for the first time, he was dismayed by the reactions of his companions. “Some day I’ll learn to keep my big mouth shut,” he muttered ruefully as he trotted to catch up to Awasin.

  They crossed the broad swampy valley, sometimes wading knee deep in the icy thaw water, and then began to climb the rock-strewn slope of the ridge where the tomb stood. The Stone House took on stature as they came closer, so that it seemed to dominate the land. This was an illusion, for the structure was not more than fifteen feet square and ten feet high. Yet the illusion had reality to it, for in a land which was otherwise devoid of any indication that men had ever passed this way, this single creation of human hands became the focal point in a sea of emptiness.

  As they climbed over the sharp-edged, frost-shattered boulders below it, the visitors felt an oppressive sense of dislocation. Again they seemed to have stepped out of the realm of familiar things into an alien and infinitely older world.

  Awasin stopped when he was ten feet from the tomb. Paying no attention to the others, he rummaged in his carrying bag and took out a plug of tobacco. He laid it down on a flat rock.

  Peetyuk stepped up beside the Indian. Taking a skin-wrapped package of dried deer meat from his own bag, he laid it down beside the tobacco.

  Jamie watched this performance with a puzzled frown on his face but held his peace. His restraint was rewarded. Awasin had been sharply observing his white companion, and when Jamie made no flippant comment and showed no sign of impatience, he explained, a little shyly, a little awkwardly.

  “We think it is a good thing to make gifts to those who have gone, Jamie. We have much, for we are alive. They have nothing, for they are dead. When you and I were here last year I forgot what is due the dead. But I told myself that if I came back I would not forget
again.” His voice became almost pleading. “Perhaps you think we are foolish, but do not laugh about it. I ask you not to laugh.”

  Jamie shook his head. “I never felt less like laughing,” he replied solemnly. He dug in his pocket and pulled out a highly valued pocketknife which he had won as a school prize in Toronto years ago. He glanced at Awasin in some embarrassment. “Can I? Is it all right if I give something too?”

  Peetyuk caught Jamie by the left arm, and squeezed hard. “That good you do that, Jamie.”

  There was a warmth in his voice which Jamie had seldom heard since their fight at Kasmere Lake. He stepped forward and laid the knife on the rock. Angeline followed him and placed a packet of tea beside the other gifts.

  There was a new buoyancy in Awasin’s voice, as though he were relieved of some deep inner tension. “I am sorry for what I said about your people, back at camp. There was a shadow coming between you and us, and it was partly my fault. There is so much anger in our hearts against white people that sometimes we turn upon our friends. You are our friend; Angeline’s, mine and Peetyuk’s. We were wrong to turn our faces from you.”

  “I never turned mine,” Angeline interjected tartly. “Speak for yourself, brother. You forgot that I like porcupines.”

  “And that means I’m a porcupine?” Jamie asked. “Okay, Angeline, you’re right. I am. And since everyone seems to be being sorry around here, I might as well tell you I’m sorry for the way I acted too. Now let’s get on with what we came to do.”

  Massive and forbidding, Koonar’s tomb had been built with great care and labor in the form of what appeared to be a solid cube of rocks whose interstices had been close-packed with muskeg sods. These sods had taken root and spread, giving the whole structure a mossy overlay. However, the appearance of a solid cube was an illusion, as Jamie had discovered the previous year. He had found a small, half collapsed tunnel leading under the north wall into an inner crypt, and had crawled inside. Now he led the way to the tunnel entrance. He stopped abruptly as he saw a white, domed object lying on the moss nearby. Peetyuk saw it at the same time and gasped.